1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the invention relate to a method for automatic registration of a patient-bound medical device with a remote data processing system, as well as a programming device for this purpose as claimed herein.
2. Description of the Related Art
Configurations are used for the continuous monitoring of vital functions of the human body in which a patient-bound medical device performs the measurement of the bodily signals, executes a partial initial processing of the signals, and then transmits this data to a remote data processing and monitoring center. Such a system is described in Published Application WO 03/095024 A2.
Furthermore, it is suggested therein that the patient-bound medical device be equipped with means to retrieve the confirmation of previously stored individuals electronically before the transmission of concrete patient measured data, and check whether a monetary electronic credit balance also stored in the device is sufficient to cover the measured data monitoring service.
For the initial registration of a patient-bound medical device which has just been put into operation with the patient, it is necessary according to the prior art to transmit device identification data, such as the serial number of the patient-bound device, from the physician in the hospital to a user at the central monitoring system by fax or in another way and then input the device identification data of the patient-bound medical device manually into an input form of the monitoring system, to ensure an identification of the system components and/or access authorization on the monitoring system side or on both sides in this way.
Due to this transmission in registration according to the prior art, which is subject to media breakdown and requires a manual input, the disadvantage arises that a disadvantageous time delay arises between the initialization of the patient-bound medical device and its practical readiness for use after completion of the registration procedure, which is caused by the administration effort. The device identification data may additionally be corrupted or lost during the transmission, which requires additional effort for correcting these errors.
In addition, the effort required for inputting the data reduces the acceptance of known devices on the part of the physicians.